Monday, October 31, 2016

LinkToVR Brings Virtual Reality To The Western Mass Business Expo 2016!

Thursday, October 20, 2016

We will have live VR demos and a guest speaker in Springfield, MA on Nov. 3rd! Expo website - https://www.wmbexpo.com/ Information on our guest speaker - https://www.wmbexpo.com/speakers/rik-shorten/ We are also working on a private VIP showing in Springfield MA and the Boston area. Please contact bill@linktovr.com if you would like to attend or demonstrate your Medical VR related product or service.

Monday, September 26, 2016

The Virtual Reality Venture Capital Alliance (VRVCA), spearheaded by HTC Vive, is making good on its promise to help kick start the VR industry having held its first meeting last week.

We’d previously reported that the group, which is comprised of 37 investment firms, moved its initial meeting from September 9th due to the large volume of submissions from startups looking for funding. Today, HTC Vive confirmed that the meeting took place in Beijing on September 20th and, from the sounds of it, was a success.

Wednesday, September 14, 2016

Using HoloLens to Visualise Motion Capture Performances in Realtime

Motion capture techniques are used throughout the VFX industry, but a new project from Mo-cap specialist and developer Jasper Brekelmans aims to bring live, augmented reality previews for motion capture performance, unlocking the ability to preview dances in realtime overlaid onto reality.

HTC Partners With Inside Secure To Bring Piracy Protection To Vive

The VR industry is growing by the day and HTC is moving to protect its Vive from an inevitable issue: content piracy.

The Taiwanese company partnered with France-based Inside Secure to help prevent VR piracy. Inside offers a range of different security solutions for web-based operations, though this deal is specifically to prevent illegally obtaining Vive content.

Oculus Teases ‘Guardian’ Boundary System For Touch, Arriving This Week

Leave it to Oculus to just casually throw some major news into a simple little tweet; the VR specialist has just announced a brand new boundary system in passing.VP of Product Nate Mitchell teased the news just moments ago. He told Oculus developers that an incoming software development kit (SDK) update, 1.8, would include Guardian, a new boundary system for the company’s upcoming position-tracked controllers, Oculus Touch. More details will be coming at next month’s anticipated developer conference, Oculus Connect 3.

HBO’s Westworld Makes Virtual Reality Debut

You may never come back from this virtual ride.Virtual reality was the first thing that came to mind after seeing the mysterioustrailerfor HBO’s Westworld back in June. Whether or not the sci-fi series produced by J.J. Abrams and written by Jonathan Nolan (The Dark Knight, Person of Interest) and Lisa Joy (Pushing Daisies) will actually put VR front and center during the show, one thing’s for sure, HBO isn’t being shy about using the immersive technology to promote their ten-episode season premiering next month.

Tuesday, September 13, 2016

Wide-Area Tracking for VR Arcades with OptiTrack

OptiTrack premiered a new demo at GDC that shows the extent of their tracking technology precision. They put passive tracking markers on a basketball and football that allowed people to go toss a ball back and forth to each other in VR.

Jaunt and Tastemade Bring Us A Perfect 360° Day In Los Angeles

This VR video experience will take you around LA with Ryan Seacrest, Conan O’Brien and of course — donuts.The food and travel video network that brought us digital programming like Food Court and Tiny Kitchen is now teaming up with a VR studio to take us on a trip to some favorite attractions here in Los Angeles.

Sony Brings Your Phone Into PlayStation VR With ‘anywhereVR’

Sony is set to bring your smartphone into VR for the first time with PlayStation VR, offering you “supreme relaxation”. Really.The company’s music division, Sony Music Entertainment, today announced a new relaxation app for its upcoming headset during a Tokyo Game Show 2016 press conference. Named anywhereVR, the experience impressively projects your phone’s display inside an immersive environment, allowing you to check messages and apps without having to remove PS VR.

Monday, September 12, 2016

Google Cardboard Camera Comes to iPhone

You can now capture and share VR photos on your iPhone.Released late last year, Google’s Cardboard Camera Android app launched as a simple way to take 3D 360-degree photos that you could experience in a Cardboard VR viewer headset.Now the app is available for those of us who may only have an iPhone, announcing Monday that Cardboard Camera is live on the iOS App Store.

MSI’s VR backpack was built for the HTC Vive

The whole VR backpack bit made the shift from one-off oddity to small scale (if still decidedly odd) movement a few months back, as a handful of notables piled onto the heap. HP and MSI were the first big names in the door and Alienware followed suit (or backpack, rather) a few months later as it showed of its own take on the burgeoning movement at E3 – in prototype form, at least.

Community Download: Will Sony Become The New King Of Virtual Reality?

The Virtual Reality scene, as it stands today, is mainly a war between two titans: Oculus and HTC.In one corner you have Oculus — the company that many consider to be the “father” of modern VR. In addition to having arguably the most recognizable name in the industry, Oculus and its Oculus Rift headset also have a powerful relationship with Samsung, and the full might of an unfathomably powerful parent company behind it: Facebook.In the other corner you have HTC — the company that brought our hands into high-end VR first and ratcheted the industry forward through its “room-scale” experiences. HTC’s Vive headset also benefits from its association to the company that co-developed the system: Valve.

Jaunt VR Names Former Hulu Leader George Kliavkoff As New CEO

Jaunt VR, a company at the forefront of cinematic virtual reality, brought on George Kliavkoff as the new Chief Executive Officer.

Kliavkoff brings a wealth of media experience with him, most recently serving as the co-president of Entertainment & Syndication with Hearst Corporation where he was responsible for cable network partnerships, television programming, merchandise licensing, digital video networks, and comic strip newspaper syndication. Hearst has high profile brand partnerships with ESPN, A&E, Complex, Cosmopolitan Television, and more.

Friday, September 9, 2016

Virtual Reality Is About To Revolutionize These Three Industries

The dawn of a new era is upon us — one of full immersion into the digital world. It’s an era that will be founded upon the technological revolution that’s been silently brewing for more than a decade. Our once-dreamed-up reality of wedding the digital world with the physical world is no longer the stuff of fabled fairytales; it’s happening, right here, right now.

Tilt Brush Update Lets You Create Big Worlds With Tiny Details

Tilt Brush, developed at Google, is one of the most popular virtual reality experiences for the HTC Vive. People simply can’t get enough of the freedom and creativity that the application provides. As a result, everything frommarriage proposals to music videos and touching tributes, and everything in between, have been created in this 3D art studio. Amazing as these creations are, they may end up looking small (literally) in comparison to what’s to come.

What Apple’s Dual Camera iPhone Means For Augmented Reality

The rumored iPhone 7 Plus with a dual-lens camera system finally made its debut at Apple’s September product presentation Wednesday. With Phil Schiller taking the stage to unveil the latest iPhone camera update, it was clear that Apple is serious about their “best camera we have ever made.”Although there weren’t drastic changes made to the physical design of the iPhone (minus that old thing called a headphone jack), Apple’s unveiling of a dual-lens camera points to a world where millions of consumers could one day put a powerful augmented reality device in their pocket.

Facebook Wins An Emmy For Oculus Story Studio’s ‘Henry’

Henry, Oculus Story Studio’s cutesy creation, has gone from lonely to loved.

Oculus just announced that the CG hedgehog, who stars in the short film of the same name, has won his first Emmy. Henry emerged victorious in the Outstanding Original Interactive Program, which apparently won unanimous approval from a panel of industry professionals. It’s the first time a piece of Oculus-made software has won a high-profile award like this.

Thursday, September 8, 2016

Adobe Shows Love For VR With New Updates To Creative Cloud’s Workflow

Adobe’s many applications are popular choices in creative circles, essential in educational environments, and are the standard in various businesses. Their individual tools can be quite expensive whether you’re look for them solo or as a business, but Creative Cloudprovides flexible collections to fit students, independent photographers, government entities, and more by offering different combinations of their programs. Announced recently and debuting at IBC 2016 this week, Adobe will be further enhancing their efforts to become a staple in the VR editing and development arenas with a slew of new tools.

Wednesday, September 7, 2016

‘Halcyon’ From SyFy Premieres Sept. 22 As A Combined Television/VR Series

Earlier this year, SyFy and its parent company NBC Universal, announced plans for an ambitious new entertainment property known as Halcyon.

This 15 episode procedural cop series features a revolutionary two-pronged approach in which 10 of the show’s episodes will be broadcast in standard 2D format on SyFy’s television channels and web outlets; and the other five episodes will be presented as virtual reality experiences.

I’m standing in the middle of a dark wooded forest, surrounded by sprawling trees that tower overhead. Each tree is glowing a soft warm color from tiny candles that line the surface of the weathered trunks. Thats when I notice the modest windows and doors covering the side of the tree. Walking ever so slowly over, I decide to stick my head into the tree trunk, which reveals miniaturized living quarters inside the tree for someone or something that calls this home.

Snapchat’s Latest Move Fuels AR Glasses Rumors

Pokemon GO may be augmented reality’s killer app, but Snapchat has been using the tech for far longer than people have been hunting monsters using their phone, and the company’s latest move suggests it may be ready to go deeper.

Monday, September 5, 2016

Chinese President Points To VR As Helping Establish ‘Innovative World Economy’

The annual B20 (Business 20) summit, which gathers leaders of businesses from countries in the G20 (Group of 20) convention got underway this weekend in Hangzhou, capital of East China’s Zhejiang Province. Opening the summit with a keynote speech was President Xi Jinping. In a 50-minute address, he spoke of China’s need to establish an innovative world economy. That process, according to the president, will be aided by the growth of new technologies such as VR.

Field In View: So, How Does Gear VR Compete With Daydream?

The Gear VR is the undisputed king of mobile virtual reality headsets right now. I’ve already sung the praises of its secretly excellent library and constant hardware revisions have continued to improve its quality. That said, there aren’t any real challengers to the Gear’s throne right now, but that’s set to change in the very near future.

‘The Impossible Travel Agency’ Is A Gorgeous VR Story From Holospark That Reacts To Your Music [Exclusive]

Seattle-based startup Holospark’s first virtual reality application debuts today at $5 on Steam for both Rift and Vive. Update: It also launched on the Oculus Store, too. Judging by their first work, this is a company you’re going to want to get to know.

Sunday, September 4, 2016

Suppose you’re playing a game like Fallout 4 in VR. In the real world you’re sitting down, but in the virtual one you’re running away from an oversized cockroach, desperately trying to stay alive. Bethesda is working on their own iteration of their iconic series, but not all first-person shooters are being remade with VR in mind.

The Bulgaria-based company is primarily working on its own software development kit (SDK) that allows developers to stream VR games developed on PC with engines like Unreal and Unity into any kind of headset. That’s not a completely new concept, but it appears the company might be working on a pretty enticing idea nonetheless; a wireless version of the HTC Vive.

Tuesday, August 30, 2016

VR Game Controllers Should Give us Superhero Capabilities, While Being Super Intuitive and Natural

For years the way to move in video games and 3D environments was pretty simple. You’d use a keyboard, a mouse, a 3D-mouse or the joysticks of a gamepad. Those were perfectly suited because of the distance between you and the screen. You were not in the 3D model or in the game, you were looking from the outside in.

A company called Dexta Robotics recently unveiled a new product that could end up revolutionizing the way VR hand tracking and interaction takes place. It’s called the “Dexmo” and it is a futuristic looking exo-skeleton that attaches over your hand like a glove. The glove is full of components that are able to communicate with a VR experience and help you actually feel virtual objects held in your actual hands.

One of the big new features of the Samsung Note 7 and its new Gear VR is USB-C — the new standard that’s not only easier to connect because the plug is reversible, but can be used to communicate data with external devices like a thumb drive.

Virtual Reality has a lot of potential uses, and not only in gaming and entertainment, although these are two areas that are likely to help drive the development and improvement of both hardware and software. VR is also being used in retail for example, by offering things like virtual mannequins and is also proving popular in education and training. In these instances, VR offers accessibility to experiences and locations that might not otherwise be accessible.

When you think of virtual reality, the first thing that comes to mind is a headset, and all the buzz around this industry is focused on these headsets. But while they certainly deserve to be the center of attention, the real potential can be unlocked through the VR accessories market.